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On a late, sunny fall afternoon at a busy café in St. Paul, a woman in her early 30’s talked with a teenage girl she was recently introduced to. The girl’s eyes lit up as she shared her vision for impacting the world by promoting positive self-image through fashion. As the girl talked, the woman envisioned the possibilities and recognized the energy of making dreams reality. At a point in their conversation, the woman who orchestrated this impromptu meeting sat watching with tears in her eyes as her current intern talked with a longtime mentee that she met at the age of 14. Continue Reading →

OKLAHOMA CITY — Miami returns to the NBA Finals stage after finishing off the Boston Celtics in a dramatic game seven (101-88) to capture their second straight Eastern Conference title. The Big Three — yes, Miami is again knocking at the door of an NBA title as they did last year. We all remember them coming up short a year ago, losing four games to two to NBA Champion Dallas. Because they did not finish the deal and win it in the 2011 Finals, this entire NBA season has been about the Miami Heat; they have been ordained, sentenced, and proclaimed as the 2012 Champion or else. Not much has changed: LeBron James (31 points, 12 rebounds), Dwyane Wade (23 points), and Chris Bosh healthy again (19 points and eight rebounds) in game seven. Continue Reading →

What a remarkable achievement at age 36 — Tiger Woods, the first billionaire athlete, has caught his childhood dream, Jack Nicklaus, in career wins on the PGA tour at 73. Golf is an incredible game, and what you achieve in it is so satisfying. Golf is an individual mental and physical test of your will to overcome yourself. When it’s over, you have to accept what your score is. No sport has been tougher on Blacks than the game golf. Continue Reading →

When Joel Maturi steps down next month to become a special assistant to the school president, he will leave a collegiate athletic environment that is markedly different than it was a decade ago when he was hired as the University of Minnesota’s first athletic director of the newly merged men’s and women’s athletic departments. In an exclusive one-on-one interview with the MSR, Maturi recently talked about the changes he has seen and other topics. The latest NCAA data says that nearly 60 percent of a Division I school’s annual athletic budget is for football, and just under 20 percent for men’s basketball. This is no different at Minnesota, whose $78 million athletic budget is largely devoted to Gopher football and men’s basketball. “Football and basketball are big business,” Maturi said. Continue Reading →

A Spanish all-sports station may soon debut in New York City. Yet there’s still not an all-Black sports radio station anywhere in this country, neither on terrestrial regular radio nor on the nation’s only satellite radio service, SiriusXM. Before the FCC approved the Sirius-XM merger in 2008, we were told that new channels for underserved communities would be established. However, only one Black-oriented channel from Howard University has been added post-merger. There’s a “Mad Dog” sports channel and a fantasy sports channel, but not one channel with Blacks talking sports all the time. Continue Reading →

Minneapolis and St. Paul, the Twin Cities’ two cities, are very close in population and size and just 15 minutes apart. One is known for being the place to be, where most everything goes on; the other is the Capital city where all the state-wide decisions are made. Minneapolis has the Vikings-Twins-Timberwolves-University of Minnesota and Lynx; St. Paul the Wild and Saints. Continue Reading →

Not only did the NBA lockout shorten the 82-game regular season to just a 66-game sprint. It also has made picking the 2012 NBA Most Valuable Player a virtual toss-up. Usually the team with the top player on the league’s best regular-season team gets the MVP. Last year that was point guard Derrick Rose for the Chicago Bulls, who played great on the league’s best regular-season team. With just five games left, the Bulls again have the NBA’s best record at 46-14, and Rose has played good again, averaging 22 points a game. Continue Reading →

On February 26, 2012, unarmed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was shot to death by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old wannabe cop and self-appointed gun-carrying neighborhood watchman in a gated community just outside Orlando in Sanford, Florida. (No local or gated community rule authorized such an armed role.)

Trayvon was returning from a convenience store three blocks from the home of his dad’s fiancée to get snacks for watching a basketball game. He was essentially shot for SWB (shopping while Black). The 911 tapes (which police withheld until forced to release them by court order) make it easier to understand this latest American tragedy, as it reveals the use of racial hate language. The shooter was told by 911 to stand down and stop trailing the young man. Continue Reading →

On the international scene last year, the Arab Spring brought an offensive of hope for positive change in the Middle East, led by the young and unemployed. It also brought an offensive uprising of violence and confrontation by those wanting to dash hope and prevent needed change. Is this what’s in store for Minneapolis? My concern is not what happens with the 21st-century Arab Spring, but rather with the Minneapolis Spring of 2012 and the disturbing pattern of developing violence (drive-by shootings, gun battles in the street, White and Black youth fighting together and against each other in and through downtown). This is a concern for everyone, not just Blacks, not just Whites. Continue Reading →

One wonders how long it took the Rybak administration to realize the powerful Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis had turned to the Republican majority in the Minnesota legislature. Unlike Black organizations that do nothing when ignored and are thus taken for granted, the Police Officers Federation, ignored by the City, went to the other party. It’s a White thing Blacks need to learn how to do, which won’t happen as long as they stay self-glued to one party. As legislative lobbyists, special-interest advocates, and legislators themselves keep their supporters informed about legislation that will affect them, I wonder why the two Black state legislators for the City of Minneapolis didn’t give our community a heads up? It could have made a difference, and it could have resulted in the federation taking a softer position instead of setting up the demise of the Civilian Review Authority (CRA). Continue Reading →